Castle of Puivert (Castèl de Puègverd)

The Château de Puivert is a Cathar castle situated in the
commune of Puivert, in the Aude département of the Languedoc.
This building, on top a hill overlooking the village and its lake,
reaches an altitude of 605 m.

The castle has been listed as a monument historique by the French
Ministry of Culture since 1902. The castle of Puivert is still in
relatively good condition. It is privately owned, but open
to the public and undergoing restoration.

In the nearby village of Puivert you can visit the "musée
du Quercorb". (The Quercorb is the area around Puivert.)

Puivert lies at 42°54'44" N, 2°03'34"
E

History

At the meeting of 1170 a troubadour
called Peire d'Auvergne penned a satirical Occitan
poem which concluded with the words

Lo vers fo fats als enfobatz
A puich-vert tot jugan rizen

This poem was composed to the sound of bagpipes
At Puivert among song and laughter

At
the start of the Wars against the Cathars, the so-called Albigensian
Crusade, Puivert's seigneur was Bernard de Congost. His wife
Alpaïs had become a Parfaite
before her death just a year earlier in 1208.

In November 1210 the Castle was besieged (just after the fall
of Termes)
by Simon
de Montfort, and fell after three days. The dispossessed
Congost family carried on the fight against the invaders.

In
1213 the seigneurie, now in French hands, was conferred by Simon
de Montfort on one of his lieutenants, Lambert de Thury. Later
it was allocated to Pons de Bruyère.

At the start of the 14th century, probably around 1310,
Thomas de Bruyère, grandson of Pons, built the present
castle, to the east of the old "Cathar castle". His
wife was Isabelle de Melun, daughter of a Grand Chamberlain of
France, whose arms are still to be seen in the building.

One room has fine carvings of minstrels, and tourists are often
told that troubadours
played in this room. This is absolute rubbish, but if you
look behind the castle you will find the foundations of the earlier
castle where troubadours really did play.

The castle, 600 meters (1970 feet) above sea level, is sited on
a green hill top (Puig-Vert). Perhaps the significance of the name
is that most castles in the area are not on green hill tops, but
rocky mountain tops.

Some points of note are:

the tower gate on the east side of the courtyard. You can see
the de Bruyère arms (a lion rampant with a forked and knotted
tail) carved in stone above the doorway. The bridge over the ditch
would have been a drawbridge. You can still see the portcullis,
and the two holes where beams would have projected to hoist the
bridge.

the courtyard is 80 meters long and 40 wide (260 x 130 feet),
surrounded by a curtain wall and the remains of six towers. In
the Northwest corner is a postern gate (used for surprise sorties
against besiegers) called the Chalabre Gate

the donjon (keep) is 35 meters (115 feet) tall and 15 meters
(49 feet) across each side. On the west of the keep are traces
of an adjoining building. Each of the four stories contains a
single room, with a defensive platform at the fifth level. The
keep comprises:

two lower levels with barrel vaulting

the third floor is the chapel. It is decorated with columns,
mouldings and shields. The ceiling is rib-vaulted. Note
the keystone of the arch. In the wall is a piscina. It is not
that usual to find chapels like this with rooms above them.

The fourth floor is a rib vaulted room, the culs-de-lampe
sculpted with figures playing musical instruments. This is the
so-called Minstrels' Chamber ("Salle des Musiciens").
The 8 musicians each play a different medieval instrument: bagpipes,
hurdy-gurdy, tambourine, lute, portable organ, psaltery, rebeck
and cithern. The room is relatively well-lit - castle rooms
typically have larger windows further up the walls. Note
the thickness of the walls, and the bench seats by the windows,
the only part of the room that was really well let, where ladies
would sew.

The fifth and top floor is a defensive platform and watch
tower (guet), originally crenelated.

Medieval Musical Instruments

Hurdy Gurdy

Portative Organ

Cithern

Psaltery

Lute

Cornemuse

Rebec

Tambourine

Of
all the Cathar
castles, Puivert is one of the best preserved. With its 35 meters
high keep in which four splendid rooms are superimposed, its towers
incorporated in its enclosure wall, this castle dominates the old
glacial lake of Puivert below.

You can climb to the top of the donjon (keep) from where you can
see the Quercorb plain to north and the peak of Bugarach to the
east. To the west you can just see Montségur
with the the high Pyrenees
behind it. The pall of black smoke rising from Montségur
on the morning of 16 March 1244 would have been clearly visible
from here.

The castle was classified as an Historic Monument (Monument historique)
in 1907.

Ruins of the Earlier Chateau
adjacent to the existing Château de Puivert

Access to the Walls of the Château
de Puivert

Silhouette of the Château de Puivert

Intramural tower, Château de Puivert

Gate with portcullis, Château de Puivert

Vaulting in the Keep, Château de Puivert

Aerial view of the Château de Puivert

Architecture

The
curtain wall, pierced with arrow slits or loopholes (flecheres),
extends some 175 m. In plan the grounds are rectangular with a
surface area of around: 3,200 m². A moat which separated
it from the plateau is almost indistinguishable today.

The main entrance to the courtyard is through a square tower
situated in the canter of the east wall. Of the original towers
there remain:

the keep (the best preserved part of the castle).

a smooth round tower in the Northeast corner

a rough (bossed) round tower in the middle
of the north wall

a square tower, with a windowed turret on
the east side

the remains of a round tower in the Southeast

As well as the central gateway in the east wall there are two
other gateways: one in the Northwest corner (defended by the keep)
and another to the south of the keep giving access to the original
castle on this site.

cousieges - Château de Puivert

Château de Puivert - Plan

Peire d'Alvernhe (Pierre d'Auvergne)

Peire d'Alvernhe is one of the best known troubadours.

Peire's most famous work is Chantarai d'aquest trobadors,
a sirventes written at Puivert in which he ridicules twelve contemporary
troubadours ("a poetical gallery") and himself. It has
been conjectured that this piece was first performed in the presence
of all twelve of the ridiculed poets in late Summer 1170 while
an embassy bringing Eleanor, daughter of Henry II of England,
to her Spanish groom Alfonso VIII of Castile stayed at Puivert
(accompanied by her mother Eleanor of Aquitaine)

The obscurity of most of the twelve poets and the attack upon
such personal characteristics as appearance and manners suggests
that the parody was good natured and performed in the presence
of all twelve victims.

The poem, a sirventes, is reproduced below with a few of the
verses translated into English.

It concludes

This verse was made to the sound of bagpipes
at Puivert, with much laughter and play.

Peired'Alvernhe - BnF MS12473 fol.

Peire d'Alvernhe, Chantarai d'aquest trobadors

I shall sing about those troubadours
who sing in many fashions, and all praise
their own verses, even the most appalling;
but they shall have to sing elsewhere,
for a hundred competing shepherds I hear,
and not one knows whether the melody's rising or falling.

In this Peire Rogier is guilty,
thus he shall be the first accused,
for he carries tunes of love in public right now,
and he would do better to carry
a Psalter in church, or a candlestick
with a great big burning candle.

And the second: Giraut de Bornelh,
who looks like a goatskin dried out in the sun,
with that meagre voice of his, and that whine,
it is the song of an old lady bearing buckets of water;
if he saw himself in a mirror,
he would think himself less than an eglantine.

And the third: Bernart de Ventadorn,
a hand's breadth smaller than Bornelh;
a fellow who worked for a wage was his father,
he shot a laburnum handbow well,
and his mother heated the oven
and gathered the brushwood together.

And the fourth, from Brive, the Limousin,
a jongleur, and the most beggarly man
between Benevento and here;
and he looks like a sick
pilgrim when he sings, the wretch,
so that I nearly pity him myself.

En Guillem de Ribas is the fifth,
who is bad outside and in,
he recites all his verses with a raucous voice,
so his singing sounds like hell,
for a dog would sing as well,
and his eyes roll up like Christ in silver.

And the sixth, Grimoart Gausmar,
a knight who tries to pass for a jongleur,
and whoever agrees to let him could not do worse,
God damn whoever gives him clothing of motley and green,
for once his costume has been seen,
a hundred more will want to be jongleurs.

And Peire de Monz- makes seven,
since the Count of Toulouse sang him
a charming song, though he himself never sang;
and whoever stole it from him is to be respected,
except it was a pity he neglected
to amputate the little foot that hangs.

And the eighth, Bernart de Saissac,
who never knew any other work
but going around begging little gifts;
and I have not thought him worth a piece of mud
since he begged En Bertran de Cardalhac
for an old cloak that stank of sweat.

And the ninth is En Raimbaut,
who thinks so highly of his poetry;
but I think nothing of his rhymes,
they have neither warmth nor cheer,
therefore I rank him with the bagpipers
who come up to you and beg for coins.

En Ebles de Sagna is the tenth,
who never had any luck in love,
though he sweetly sings his little air;
a vulgar puffed-up shyster
who, they say, for two cents
rents himself here, and sells himself there.

And the eleventh, Gonzalgo Roitz,
who vaunts his skill in song
and thus presumes to call himself a knight;
no strong blow was ever struck
by him, he was never that well armed,
unless, of course, he got off in flight.

And twelfth is an old Lombard,
who calls his friends all cowards,
and he himself is terrified;
and yet the songs he writes are valiant,
with bastard phrases neither Occitan nor Italian,
and he is known to all as Cossezen, "Just Right."

Peire d'Alvernhe, now he has such a voice
he sings the high notes, and the low (and the in-between).
and before all people gives himself much praise;
and so he is the master of all who here convene;
if only he would make his words a little clearer,
for hardly a man can tell what they mean.

Lo vers FO faitz als enflabotz
A Puoich-vert, tot iogan rizen.

This verse was made to the sound of bagpipes
at Puivert, with much laughter and play.

Royal Marriage

The meeting of troubadours at which and for which this sirventes
was written was probably convoked as part of the celebrations
to mark the forthcoming marriage of

Eleanor of England (13 October 1162 - 31 October 1214) was Queen
of Castile and Toledo as wife of Alfonso VIII of Castile. She
was the sixth child and second daughter of Henry II of England
and Eleanor of Aquitaine. [baptised by Henry of Marcy]. When she
was 14 years old, before 17 September 1177, Eleanor was married
to King Alfonso VIII of Castile in Burgos.

Her daughter, Blanch (de Castile) was married on 23 May 1200
to Prince Louis of France, who succeeded his father as King Louis
VIII on 14 July 1223. Crowned Queen at Saint-Denis with her husband
on 6 August 1223. Regent of the Kingdom of France during 1226-1234
(minority of her son) and during 1248-1252 (absence of her son
on Crusade).

Her son, Ferdinand, was heir of the throne since his birth. It
was on his behalf that Diego of Acebo and the future Saint Dominic
travelled to Denmark in 1203 to secure a bride.

Critics believe that Peire d'Alvernha wrote the sirventes during
the trip that an illustrious Castilian retinue took to Bordeaux
in 1170. Alfonso VIII was to marry Eleonor of England, daughter
of Henry II of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine. We have the name
of the main Castilian ambassador to Bordeaux, Gonzalo Ruiz de
Azagra, a Navarrese who became a vassal and courtier to Alfonso
VIII. This solves the problem of the ientity of "Gonzalgo
Roitz", and links the sirventes and Peire d'Alvernha to Alfonso
VIII de Castilla: Peire wrote "Chantarai d´aqestz trobadors"
for and during Gonzalo Ruiz and Eleonor's trip to Castilla.

The festive occasion justifies the satire's cheerful and convivial
mood, as well as the presence of so many troubadours: a royal
wedding between the open handed Plantagenet clan and the powerful
king of Castille promised lavish patronage. The celebration attracted
famous troubadours such as Giraut de Bornelh, Peire d'Alvernha,
and Peire de Monzo, who probably came from the court of Alfonso
II de Aragón, since this monarch intervened decisively
in the wedding's organization. Alfonso VIII presumably rewarded
all the troubadours in attendance regardless of where they came
from, and through this generosity he laid the basis for his fame
as a munificent patron. Peire d'Alvernha and his comrades obliged
him, and thereafter celebrated Alfonso's virtues in their songs.
Peire d'Alvernha's poetry proves that he had close relations with
the Castilian court under Sancho III, and later under Alfonso
VIII himself.

Eleanor of England, Queen of Castile

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